no time to post, time to go through all the new stuff. and yeah, it's made of win.

Yeahhh.... I guess I wouldn't be quite myself if I didn't do something wrong constructing a simple thread.

And upon this discovery came the inevitable spontaneous nerd-gasm of thousands of fanboys and fangirls. 

-w-

Thief Series General Discussion (795 Viewing)

sounds a lot

Great patch(es)!! Got to convert my textures now
 

I've tested this a bit and come up with a preliminary install procedure:
1. Pull the shock folder from the CD (as advised in the SS2 tech FAQ)
2. Install SS2Tool v3.6 but uncheck "Bug Fixes" as none of them are needed anymore
3. Extract ss2_v24.zip on your desktop.
4. Extract new_dark.zip and contrib.zip into your game folder

Can we still run ADoB v30 with the new SS2 patch installed?

Also, if you update SS2MM for this patch, then please would you consider adding the following features:

1. Please add a second column in the mod list view windows, showing a letter(s), describing what type of mod each one is. I.e. 'F' for Fan Mission, 'B' for bug-fix, 'V' for Visual enhancement, 'A' for audio enhancement, 'G' for gameplay enhancement/changes, etc.

So that the mod window would look something like:

Anomalies, Discrepancies, and outright Bugs (Beta 0.3.0)     BG
Hi-Torque Medsci                                                              V
FM: The Minstrel (1.0) + spawn patch                                 F
Rebirth Beta 01 - Complemented Version                            V
Return to the UNN 1.0.1 (sky+spawn-patched)                   F
secmod_fix_for_tacticool_laser_pistol                                BV
shmup_1.1                                                                     A
SHTUP Beta 6                                                                  V
ArcaniacGraphicsPack Reduxed                                          V
ss2_christine_ponterbeestationv3                                     F

and add the options:


'Show all' (shows all mods, as it does by default), 'Show only fan missions' (shows only the mods with an 'F' in their mod type column), 'Show only bug-fixes', 'Show only visual enhancements', 'Show only audio enhancements', 'Show only game-play enhancements'

When 'Show all' is active, then clicking on the 'Name' bar would list all mods in their alphabetical order, and clicking on a letter (BGVA, or F) would list the mods with the first mods listed being the ones with that letter in their mod type, i.e. so clicking on 'F' would list the mods with 'F' in their mod type first, so the fan missions would all be listed first.

This might necessitate adding a database function into SS2MM so it knows what mods are what type(s), but given how few mods there are for SS2 I don't think it would be a problem?

2. Please could you make it so every fan mission has it's own save game slots? So that when you start SS2 (via SS2MM) with a fan mission, then the save game slots for that fan mission are present (i.e there could be a folder for each set of fan missions and one for vanilla SS2). This should probably be extended to gameplay modifications too, to prevent confusion and to stop people from trying to load a save game created in a different SS2 mod state.

For players, the main significance is that installing T1/T2/SS2 just got a lot easier. Install base game, install patch, play. The cutscenes just work, widescreen just works, bloom and HDR just work, you can rebind the mousewheel, etc, etc. It runs a lot better, it looks and sounds a bit nicer, and it requires no effort to get working.

I don't know what all the fuzz is about, the SS2Tool has done that for ages. Sure, this new patch does a lot cleaner job but on the surface it's pretty much the same. I think it's a bit unfair to all the contributors on this site and TTLG to pretend that Shock2 wasn't playable until this new patch came out (i.e. RPS).
 I guess the modders have to realize its new potential, first.


So, any news on the author? Has Arkane got any Irrational/LGS connections left? Most of those things shouldn't be possible without access to the source code.

I don't know what all the fuzz is about, the SS2Tool has done that for ages. Sure, this new patch does a lot cleaner job but on the surface it's pretty much the same. I think it's a bit unfair to all the contributors on this site and TTLG to pretend that Shock2 wasn't playable until this new patch came out (i.e. RPS).
 I guess the modders have to realize its new potential, first.

I totally agree that people have done *fantastic* work on SS2, both altering/modding it, and making it playable on modern systems, but I don't think the release of this patch cheapens that in any way, except (as you say) for the sites who imply that before this patch the games were all but unplayable on non-period machines. I haven't yet tried this patch on SS2 or Thief 2 (first I was at work, then I had to go 'round a mate's new flat, to help him move his stuff in - always happened when there's something you want to do, never when you're bored  ) but from my quick glances on http://www.ttlg.com/forums/forum.php (where they mainly discuss the T2 patch, phiistines  ) it seems that the patch improves loading times, in-game speed, fixes some bugs, allows the mouse wheel to be defined as a control (wheel up, and wheel down, separately!), all of which, I imagine, will apply to SS2,so the patch does have some advantages even for players like us, whose SS2 installation is already fully Windows 7 compatible.

And judging by the way the Thief 2 modders are singing the praises of the patch's editor improvement, it seems like the editor can now support much more complex and details levels than ever before. And the fan made levels that approached the limits of the editor pre-patch, and ran slowly or unplayable in the game, now run perfectly in the (patched) game, so much so that people are talking about re-doing some of their old creations but adding the parts they were forced to miss out, or just building on pre-existing maps. Though no doubt some people will aim to push the new editor as much as possible, especially those who are starting brand new levels.

So, any news on the author? Has Arkane got any Irrational/LGS connections left? Most of those things shouldn't be possible without access to the source code.

)

The speculation is that he/she/they is one or more people who is actually an active member of the Thief and/or SS2 modding community, possibly a regular on http://www.ttlg.com/forums/forum.php (or this site, who knows?), who released this work anonymously in case there are any legal repercussions. It's a pity that (if true) the person feels like this, but if they want to remain anonymous then we have to respect that, so even if I was enough of a regular on SS2/T2 forums to speculate on which posters I think could make something of this quality, which I'm not, I wouldn't.

Apparently the source code of T2/SS2 was discovered a year or two back ( http://www.ttlg.com/forums/showthread.php?t=132035 ) and perhaps this mysterious person(s) got his hands on it, and reverse engineered it enough to deduce the necessary changes and bug fixes in the Windows versions of the games. Maybe, but it seems a bit of a stretch to me to jump from *possibly* working Dreamcast source code to the quality of the Windows patch we see here. Still, stranger things have happened, and whatever the origin, we have the working patch.

Would someone be able to post a list of all the visual mods that are included in the demo? I'm having trouble figuring out which ones I should install.

Would someone be able to post a list of all the visual mods that are included in the demo? I'm having trouble figuring out which ones I should install.

if you mean the SS2 demo that has been provided with the new patches, I'm definitely seeing:
-SHTUP
-ADAOB (SHEMP textures)
-vurt's space
-Tacticool weapons

maybe more?

I've tested this a bit and come up with a preliminary install procedure:
1. Pull the shock folder from the CD (as advised in the SS2 tech FAQ)
2. Install SS2Tool v3.6 but uncheck "Bug Fixes" as none of them are needed anymore
3. Extract ss2_v24.zip on your desktop.
4. Extract new_dark.zip and contrib.zip into your game folder

this should be posted in the ss2tool topic as well.

3. Extract ss2_v24.zip into your game folder

...more specifically you should extract new_dark.zip from within ss2_v24.zip into your game folder.. most people already know, but in case someone new to all this reads

Speaking of which, I'm planning on responding re: space images I just haven't had time lately. Sry bout that.

no worries

You didn't, I didn't, but I know a lot of people who did.

Also, with the crop_movies option, they now display properly on widescreen monitors.

And you can use the mousewheel to scroll through text in the MFDs! 

..sooo, when we can expect the new version of ss2tool to pop up?